Your Royal Highnesses,
Excellencies,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

On behalf of my ASEAN colleagues, it is a great pleasure for me to welcome our dialogue counterparts from Australia, Canada, the European Union, Japan, the Republic of Korea, New Zealand and the United States to the 1994 Bangkok Post Ministerial Conferences.

We in ASEAN highly value the importance of this gathering at the Post Ministerial Conferences which serves to promote a better mutual understanding on various international political and economic issues of common concern as well as in furthering bilateral cooperation between ASEAN and the Dialogue Partners. For almost two decades, this mechanism has served us well in fostering the spirit of friendship and partnership among us and enabling us to have a constructive and productive dialogue relationship. The broadening of PMC process through the launching of the ASEAN Regional Forum has enhanced the opportunities for our discussion at the PMC to focus more on specific security issues, as well as other important aspects of mutual cooperation, namely, economic, trade, development, environment and drugs. As I look through the agenda, I am convinced that our deliberations will contribute to the improvement of regional and international cooperation. We must strive to create a better world by engaging our full efforts in addressing global and regional issues. Our objective is to promote a peaceful and stable international environment conducive to economic growth and prosperity within the context of this multilateral dialogue. Mutual respect, mutual trust, understanding, as well as shared values are equally important to this process.

Now that ASEAN's relations with its Dialogue Partners have become more mature, it may be timely to redefine the dialogue relationship to reflect our mutual concerns and interests. Development and functional cooperation remain the vital core of our overall relationship with each of our Partners, and we shall endeavour to see that it is mutually rewarding and worthy of the efforts invested into it. It is essential that our cooperation is responsive to the region's needs and priorities in order to ensure tangible benefits to the socioeconomic development of this region. We should also take a broader view of the dialogue cooperation process. In the future, it should give due attention to cooperative projects which promote human and social issues by according high priority to poverty reduction, productive employment and environmental regeneration. Our cooperation in the dialogue ramework should aim to resolve regional issues and should serve to reinforce ASEAN regionalism.

ASEAN values the benefit of having all the Dialogue Partners present here today and we certainly hope that the outcome of our deliberations will be fruitful and benefit the overall relations among our nations, as well as contribute to the cause of peace and economic prosperity in this region and beyond.

Thank you.